


Math Doesn't Solve Everything: Part Deux

by Cleo



Series: Math Doesn't Solve Everything [2]
Category: Numb3rs
Genre: Angst, Episode Related, Episode Tag, Gen, M/M, Pre-Slash, Sibling Incest, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-06-01
Updated: 2006-06-01
Packaged: 2017-10-19 19:33:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,034
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/204461
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cleo/pseuds/Cleo
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Charlie computes his and Don's reactions to the bullpen shooting.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Math Doesn't Solve Everything: Part Deux

**Author's Note:**

> WARNINGS: This fic has incestuous overtones for the brothers Eppes. DON’T LIKE that cup of tea DON'T READ IT! Thank you.
> 
> This is a companion piece to Math Doesn't Solve Everything and came about because I couldn't get the image of Charlie clinging to his laptop after the shooting in the episode Rampage. I wrote this after much prodding from list sibs and my mate Joey/Xander who suggested I do a Charlie POV. Thanks Alex/Odysseus for the wonderful beta job and soundboarding.

It was three in the morning and Charlie was in the garage trying to work out the problem behind his insomnia. He worked on his ever elusive PnP equation while he tried to sort through the subconscious thoughts that disturbed his sleep. When the equation did nothing to soothe his troubled mind, he decided to tackle the problem head on. He figured if he could encapsulate it in mathematical terms then he could solve it like all his other problems. He'd use this as a trial run to apply his cognitive thought models in a test situation. Just to see if some of the equations held up to a real life scenario.

He cleared the board roughly of the jumbled equations he had worked on and quickly jotted down the two subject groupings he needed. Since his cognitive models dealt with human thought the subject groupings in his equation would fit well. After all he was trying to figure out the potential cognitive interactions between two human beings. Then he took into account what factors were involved within each individual grouping, in short what made each tick. He paced restlessly back and forth as he figured out what the optimal conditions were for the two subjects to flourish separately. He jotted down some more variables for consideration. Many anomalous notations were scribbled along the edges of the boards unsure if they would factor in or not.

He stepped back and looked at what he had down, shaking his head at no one in particular. He agitatedly wrote down even more factors that could impact his calculations, hesitated on erasing some presuppositions then decided on leaving them in but compensating for it being potentially inaccurate. The equation was shaping up but as yet there were still too many data variables that left a big gaping hole in the conclusions. He knew he needed to figure out what maintained each grouping individually if he wanted to figure out what they would need to bolster them as a combined set, so that it would present itself in the results. Charlie knew even an incomplete theoretical equation could at least point in a general direction yet so far he wasn’t seeing it.

Once again the equations weren't balancing out. It was as if a very important component that he couldn't find was missing. He knew realistically that in the case of the shooting at the bullpen and how close he'd come to death, it didn't matter. But still he felt that all the components should add up to mean something. Yet all his mind kept coming back to was the trajectory path of the bullet and the probability pattern of the blood splatter that could have caused Don's death resulting in Charlie being covered in Don's blood due to the bullet's impact through Don's flesh.

That image caused Charlie to erase a particularly troublesome part of the equation with a bit more force than necessary. It wasn't so much the fact that they both could have been killed, if the trajectory was changed and the positioning different then it could have been Don with Charlie's blood splattered on him, it was the way he had felt when he realized he was scared. All his life his math had been his safety but that day someone had shot a hole in it, literally. Though it didn't stop his math from feeling secure it just made him afraid of being afraid and that didn't add up to Charlie either.

But there was another fear of Don, no matter what, that wouldn't go away. When the bullets were flying Charlie latched on to the only thing he could to comfort himself, his laptop, because the one thing he really wanted comfort from was protecting him. Don had always equaled safe for Charlie when they were younger. There were days recently though when safe wasn't enough, days when for Charlie the demand for safety was disproportionate to need. He feared to name that need and on the day of the shooting safety hadn't been enough. So he'd held on to his laptop at a loss about how to get what he needed from the one person he couldn't.

Charlie hadn't felt like that since his mother had died. He and Don during their time apart had finally became equals but during their mother's illness he hadn't felt it. He'd wanted to reach out to his brother like he used to and have Don make it all better but when he looked at him, Charlie had had to recalculate and upon doing so reached the conclusion that his brother meant so much more to him now. During Don's absence Charlie had grown up, moved on and learned not to need his big brother to feel safe. Though he could feel safe via his math or colleagues and even occasionally dating it wasn't the same. He hadn't realized what Don's absence in his life had meant, only that he was missing something. Then when Don had returned, Charlie saw the final data fall into place and understood it was Don that had been missing.

When his brother touched him after the shooting he couldn't stand the feelings it provoked. Couldn't stand the fact that at that moment, he had wanted Don to comfort him as more than a brother. Math couldn't tell him whether or not Don could be all he wanted him to be and Charlie had no idea if there was an equation able to solve this dilemma. But all his calculations so far, incomplete as they were, did prove to him that together they could flourish. That together they could sustain each other but in what roles? That was the missing data. Suddenly, for Charlie, it all added up. What the huge hole in the data was and what it meant for his relationship with Don. It meant that the worst part of loving his brother was the need to love his brother.

With that staggering epiphany Charlie slumped in one of the chairs that was scattered around the garage and contemplated the next progression of his altered feelings towards his brother. He didn't even realize that the sun had risen.


End file.
